


Roadblock

by rainer76



Category: Fringe
Genre: Gen, References to season one ep The Inner Child and current series
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-09-30
Updated: 2011-09-30
Packaged: 2017-10-24 04:32:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 902
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/259043
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rainer76/pseuds/rainer76
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Inaction can be seen as an action in itself</p>
            </blockquote>





	Roadblock

“Sugar, you’ve been standing on this corner longer than I have.”

She smiles at him, the lipstick on her mouth is peach, staining the end of her filter as she drags on the cigarette; she’s old for the profession, cheap hair extensions, fake nails, her mascara’s ruined with the soft rain. September inclines his head, droplets falling from the brim of his hat as he observes her. She flicks the butt roadside, a firefly of trailing light, and grinds her high-heels against the pavement. Her smile becomes fixed when he fails to engage.

“If you’re looking for relief from the chemo, sweet-cheeks, I can make it worthwhile.”

There were three women on the corner when September arrived, rail thin, their eyes fox bright. She’s more curvaceous than the others, lines etched across her face, her clothes skin tight, revealing too much while flattering little. Four cars have slowed down in the last hour but inevitably sped up when she approached. She’s unimportant. September sees her birth, her path and her death, the contingencies of her existence stretching out like the shivery line of a spider web. “I’m not supposed to interfere.”

“Sweetheart, if you’re breathing in this world you’re interfering.”

Sweetheart, sweet-cheeks, sugar, he counts the monikers as they appear in each new sentence.

“Take for example our two cops over there,” her voice turns sour, a bitter twist to her mouth as she nods in the direction of an SUV, parked in a quiet off-street. “They’re not watching us, but you can be damned sure they’re interfering in my trade. Cocksuckers,” she adds, offhandedly.

There is not, September notes, any actual cocksucking going on. He’s been monitoring for two hours, he would be aware. He turns his attention back to the SUV. The interior light flickers on, a tall man with glasses, buttoned-down suit, pink mouth, strolls across the road, wallet in hand. The girl remains in the car. The woman at his side shifts impatiently. “How old are you, sweety? If you’re willing to pay…”

“…I can rub some of that stiffness out of you,” September finishes, his words a mimicry of her thoughts. She startles. September looks at her unblinkingly.

Time has no meaning. Among his peers, September is the youngest, but he’s considerably older than the woman before him, he’s older than the two agents conducting a stakeout combined. In linear time, from point A to point B with the most direct route available, September (technically) is fourteen; but it doesn’t allow for the curving of time, for the years September spent in the future or the decades of schooling in the past. He was birthed in darkness, forgotten, until his brethren came.

“I guess some of those lines are as old as I am,” she laughs. There’s a thread of uncertainty in her voice, she tucks a strand of hair behind her ear. The red satin of her bra-strap slides down one shoulder.

“You must be cold,” he says, politely.

“Are you offering your jacket?” There’s a smirk, she rakes her eyes down his attire as if measuring for wealth.

“No.”

The partner, juggling two take-away coffees, darts across the road again. Much has changed, September intones, and much has remained the same. In the brief flare of light as the door opens, Agent Dunham’s features are haloed. September carries the memories of all possible alternatives, (what was, what is, what may be). In a world rewritten, he remembers the calmness of her thoughts as she plucked the yellow M&M’s from the pile, inedible, because they reminded her of medicine. Her thoughts had reached out to him then, coyly wrapping around September’s mind in a layer of warmth, and in all the years since, never entirely left. September carries three items on his person, his personnel communication device, his weapon, and a plastic toy named Roadblock, pressed into his hand by a man who no longer exists. All those decades ago, September didn’t know the law; he had wanted to help for no other reason than to feel the glimmering light of her thoughts, to see the beauty of her smile, how it transformed her. To stop a killer. Centuries later, September knows the errors of interference.

And yet, the boy was important to her, he was important to September for the same reason.

“You are dying,” he says, precisely.

Her mouth drops open.

He sees a malignant cancer in her uterus, he sees bruises on her neck, he sees her under the wheels of a car, lying stiffly in her own vomit, he sees her smiling, he sees her heading west. Knowledge, in endless derivatives, becomes useless.

She backpedals, her face twisting with fear. “Sick fuck,” she hisses.

“I intended no threat.”

Down the street, the SUV’s headlights come on, the car rolling forward toward the next intersection, turning smoothly into the traffic. There’s a briefcase in his stolen car, a gadget September refused to activate last night while standing outside Dr. Bishop’s lab, and the memory of chocolate M&Ms, which tasted like nothing. They were intangible to his senses until the moment Olivia bit down on one, and the flavours sparked, rushing into existence, dizzying pleasure for a boy born in the dark tunnels of New York. His first independent act of freedom was to help Olivia, to _act _– September notes coolly as he walks away – he has yet to break the habit.__


End file.
